If you’re wondering why there’s two days, well, as part of the Dreamlight Creator’s Program, I was able to start playing yesterday :) So, first things first, my very first day in the Valley! You can also check out my Youtube channel for the video versions as well.
Day 1
So, I played around 10 and a half hours of the game and honestly, there’s probably a lot of things I could have done better. I will say the game has a lot of grinding and sometimes, things aren’t super clear. Regardless, here is a full overview of my very first day in Dreamlight Valley! (You can also find my entire playthrough for the day here)
Immediately upon getting into the Valley, I did notice one tiny issue– my outfit’s designs were gone! It was just a blank dress and a blank set of ears. It felt as empty and awkward as the inside of my new house (but it was still… cozy in its own way).
Thankfully, once I actually unlocked the Wardrobe not too long after the conversation, my Touch of Magic outfit was there safe and sound for me to change into. I also had fun decorating the room with some of the items. I couldn’t fit everything I wanted to as the room was rather small at the moment, but I did my best.
After that, I pretty much was in pure distraction mode as I searched for all the Magic Tools. I didn’t expect the Time Trial mode when pulling thorns which was pretty nerve-wracking. While I managed to complete the coin one, I ran into a glitch with all the crop/forageable ones I ran into, unfortunately.
I did eventually manage to get all the Tools though.
One thing I’ll say is the game always has tasks for you to do, but I think that can be a little overwhelming at times. I barely did much with customizing things because most of my focus was the story and upgrading things. I would say my biggest issue right now though is that upgrades get expensive very quickly. There’s many that maybe start at 1K-3K for the initial cost or upgrade only for the next to be 20K+. There are some that do start at 5K and then jump to that 20K-30K and a few that go from like… 2K to 10K before having 20K+, but it just feels really extensive and most of your gameplay will be grinding for Dreamlight and Star Path Currency and using those tasks to earn Star Coins for use in everything else. At times, the grind did feel a bit tiring for me, even on Day 1, but there’s so much charm that it makes me want to play still anyway.
That said, the game is truly very friendly with stamina regain. You regain it SO quickly in your house and a decent amount with food that grows back pretty fast, so I never felt worried about it. You also regain all your stamina upon leveling up.
Despite my critiques, I actually managed to do a lot in these 10 hours. Such as:
- Fully upgrade Goofy’s Stall in both Peaceful Meadow and Dazzle Beach
- I managed to unlock 2 biomes: Dazzle Beach and the Forest of Valor (I suppose technically Peaceful Meadow too, but that just uses the Pickaxe)
- I hit level 15
- I upgraded my house and its room size to the biggest size
- I got Goofy to Friendship level 10 and got most friendship up to about 4 or 5. WALL-E is at 7 and Remy and Maui are 2 or 3.
- I managed to start my descent into the mysterious cave… I’m up to the second puzzle.
- I unlocked all 3 bottom floor realms and have enough Dreamlight to unlock the Frozen Realm for Day 2. Remy, Moana, Maui, and WALL-E are all moved in.
- Scrooge’s shop has been upgraded once already.
- I already got most of the items I really wanted from the Star Path
I liked that moving characters in let you take a cute commemorative photo.
The Star Path actually has an interesting system in the sense that you just need 3 items from each “page” to unlock the next and that the Premium gives you additional tasks. The tasks can be kind of tricky at times (some are definitely harder than others, or at the least, more time consuming), but none of them have time limits and they cycle as soon as you finish one. I would say my biggest advice is every time you’re notified you completed a Challenge, whether for Dreamlight or the Star Path, complete it immediately as most won’t carry over.
Of the Realms, Remy’s was my favorite to do. It lets you kind of experiment with cooking dishes with infinite ingredients (that he has, anyway) which is really cool. I ended up picking “Bell Pepper Puffs”, “Vegetable Casserole”, and “Apple Pie” for my dishes. I’d love to know how the other options go (Hearty Salad, Pizza Margherita, Banana Pie) and hopefully we can work together to figure out as many recipes as possible! I also want Remy’s house style for my own character’s house, honestly.
WALL-E’s was fine for what it was, but I had hoped for more from Moana’s considering the whole sailing thing, but you pretty much just needed to pick the right option (Which… I found obvious which is why I picked it last so I could see the others incase they had any neat treasure or surprises) and then go through the mist to catch a single fish. The scenery was nice though.
The only other thing I really did was adjust my room more after having upgraded it. I’m looking forward to getting more done tomorrow, but it feels like a lot of things depend on me just getting more Biomes, Mining RNG, and grinding up for more Star Coins.
I will say the thing I’m struggling with most is you can find so much new stuff per Biome, but your house storage upgrades fairly slow, and your inventory upgrade becomes very expensive after the first, yet the best way to earn more money is from removing Night Thorns and exploring other Biomes, but then you just end up back in the constant full inventory cycle. x-x I hope I manage to handle it all better.
Another situation is that it’s SUCH an advantage to hang out with whichever character will boost a certain thing you’re doing, but you also level up characters easily and get to pick which they help with and it’s just… a lot, honestly. There’s so many little things to keep track of and it really adds up. I just hope I manage to make a lot of progress tomorrow too.
That said, I had REALLY hoped to try and find Minnie today if only because Ghost Minnie is kind of terrifying.
Anyway, fingers crossed for finding Minnie and actually managing to give animals food they like tomorrow alongside everything else!
Days 2 and 3
So, Day 2 very much rolled into Day 3 to start. There were many quests done and a lot of revelations.
My biggest goal, more than anything, was to Save Minnie. At the very least, we were making progress.
I also unlocked this really pretty Circlet!
I then remembered I can make Chests which I used to free me from my storage issues:
But then… something strange happened. Despite not being able to find any Emeralds, the quest to save Donald suddenly updated. I’m confused why, but I was glad to just be able to save him. This was pretty nostalgic for various reasons, but I’m glad we found Donald and managed to get the Orb of Courage thanks to him.
Next, I spent a lot of time grinding. I just wanted to get things done. I also finally unlocked WALL-E’s garden as well. Key to Seaweed: Fish when there is no circle of bubbles/outside of the circles.
There’s also Moana’s Boat I finished up and it expands so much. Definitely helps with fishing, but also it feels up your inventory so fast.
I fully upgraded my house as well and am much anticipating house skins because… the Yellow house isn’t really my thing.
My main goal, thankfully, was completed! Minnie was successfully saved! Minnie really got the short end of the stick to some extent… I felt so bad for her.
I also finally got to continue the story– turns out I needed to redig the holes for the seed to do Test 2 again. The whole thing kind of bugged for me a little, but I was happy to finally get it done and get the Orb of Power.
I finally finished the Frozen area as well (which I had opened up earlier, but didn’t really take pictures in for some reason? It took me a long while to make those Windchimes) and Anna came! It was nice she remembered so much.
I didn’t expect the crazy adventure and what we had to do for the Orb of Trust though. It’s also kind of never explained if Kristoff was okay? Hopefully he did get his love for Anna back when we put in the Orb since it has yet to be brought up again.
In the process, we also had something very important confirmed (as hinted to when we first ran into Mother Gothel with the start of getting this Orb), we WERE the previous ruler… So, what happened? Why did we become so sad and lonely? Did we need to move and lashed out? Or did we lose someone? There’s so many questions here.
Ariel as well, who we found after fixing the raft with Goofy (I figured it would lead to her), hinted as much that we’re much older now. Maybe we were a teenager then? Or a kid? It just leaves me with a lot of questions. Plus, how some characters seemed to manage to keep their memories regardless.
Ariel and Elsa then moved in. (Ursula also has a place now too, though, her house kind of scares me)
And I finished Goofy’s Scrapbook quests… I think I would’ve picked a nicer area if I realized it’d set up a group photo.
Finally, we left off activating the very suspicious structure I noticed in the Cave. I’m very curious where the story will go next.
I really only stopped there as we hit an issue where Elsa was in the place we needed to clear the way to and others I needed to see were asleep so… Break time!
I popped in later than I would’ve liked, but at least I was finally able to finish Elsa’s quest. And I can see there’s clearly more to it already.
I also decorated a little more outside my house but haven’t really done much. There’s barely anything I actually plan to keep where it currently is, but I need to see all the different furniture we can get before I really know where to start with decorating.
I didn’t really end up taking any other screenshots– the Forgotten Lands is kind of terrifying, but it feels like I can’t actually do anything there yet. Even the Critters that are supposed to spawn there haven’t yet. It’s also kind of hard to see, but at least I got the final flowers I needed.
I did figure out favorite food for Critters though! Now, if only I was better at finding and approaching them…
Squirrel – Peanuts
Rabbits – Carrot
Turtle – Seaweed
Raccoon – Blueberries
Crocodiles – Lobster
Foxes – White Sturgeon
Sunbirds – Orange Houseleek
No clue on Ravens though as they don’t seem to be spawning yet.
Kristoff’s situation also got brought up with Anna’s quest, but his dialogue kind of expresses otherwise so it’s still odd. Regardless, I’m sure we’ll restore his memories.
My next goals are just extreme friending to get more quests unlocked. The number of items you need for quests feels way too much though… I’ve also hit the issue I was worried about with the Star Path where it’s large numbers of things I don’t have interest in bothering with… like catching 20 Tuna. I’m glad I at least got most of the things I wanted already.
I also hope it rains so I can finish Elsa’s quest already…